Allen Ginsberg

"I have heard the Gettysburg address / and the Ginsberg address," quipped Lawrence Ferlinghetti, American poet and publisher, more than 50 years ago, in his iconic poetry collection "A Coney Island of the Mind." The reference to Beat legend Allen Ginsberg, while playful, is at the same time indicative of Ferlinghetti's immense admiration for his colleague and friend. This admiration goes as far back as 1955, when Ferlinghetti agreed in principle to publish then-unknown Ginsberg's highly controversial poem "Howl" through his newly minted press, City Lights Publishers. The relationship between the two, crucial to the life of American poetry, can now be...

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